What to Expect at Your Hearing Aid Fitting

Interesting discussion! I bought my aid a year ago from Costco, because it cost far less. The person who has worked with me is not an audiologist, but appears to have done all of the things that one could want or expect, including activating the telecoil several months later after I acquired a smartphone and, recently, pairing the aid with a microphone designed to work with it. For a while, I was afraid that I was somehow getting less because she is not an audi, but the audiologist I consulted, part of the clinic that does CIs in this part of the country, gave Costco very high marks for the most part. In fact, she was not aware of Live Transcribe, although the Costco person was. Go figure!

julieo4 and arrowshooter,

The one clinic audiologist told me that my aid purchased at Costco a year ago is new. It does have a telecoil, and the Costco fitter paired it with my smartphone when I acquired one several months later. She told me that she knew there would be a mic to pair with the aid, and that was correct. The other clinic audi (who only tests hearing to evaluate for possible CI) was totally dismissive of Costco on all counts. I scored 55% on the Ci test, 5 points above the level where Medicare would pay for a CI. She told me to spend $6,000 on two aids, wait six months, and come back to see if my hearing would have degraded enough for a CI for my ear that hasn't heard much for decades, and then a new aid for my other ear--a total cost in less than a year of $9,000!

Costco aids are about half the cost of the same aid elsewhere. There are several options, depending on amount and type of loss. The aid I bought has a two-year guarantee against everything, including loss and damage. There is no written statement about subsequent appts. for adjustments, and I've never been told that I can't have an appt. when I've asked for one. The nearest Costco is only 60 miles away...half the distance of the CI clinic. The only thing that I can complain about is that the Costco phone system isn't set up to take messages, so you have to call back if it's busy.

If I ever find a place in this little town where there's an induction loop (not likely!), I'll try that out. During weekly sessions of our lecture group, I sit in the front row and have my mic handy if the speaker tends to wander away from the podium while showing PowerPoints. If the speaker stays close to the podium, I generally don't need the mic. The first day I had it, I left it on, sitting on the table in front of me, during the break and was surprised to hear several people talking to the speaker while I was in the restroom about 75 feet away--surprise! I wasn't able to understand, because there were many voices, (I have a great deal of distortion at all times), but I could hear voices if not words. Because of the distortion, I rely on speech reading along with what I hear.

As for music, I quit playing when my right ear went south because the recruitment literally made me sick and I wasn't able to hear others playing around me. For years, I didn't listen to music, but about 10 years ago I began to listen to classical and jazz that I knew well, filling in the missing parts in my mind. Since I went bilateral, the distortion is so dreadful that all higher instruments (flutes, trumpets, etc.) sound like kazoos. I went to a concert with the Air Force quintet...kazoos! Imagine that! After several years, I'm hoping that the recruitment will taper off, as it did with my right ear after many years. So far, this recruitment isn't quite as bad as it was for my right ear, but the distortion is very hard to learn to live with. I hear sounds, but I don't know what they are--the car engine, the dishwasher or washer, microwave, a faucet running...all sound the same, just pulsating rumbling noise. Part of that is the new tinnitus in my left ear, so when I walk a quarter mile to the mailbox along our gravel road, it constantly sounds as though there might be a car coming even though there seldom is. When a car does approach, it isn't much louder than the T! Strange world out there!

Next trick will be to take a deep breath and start what is likely to be weeks of effort to get Charter to display captions on more than one channel on our TV. I'll work on that after I finish all the fall chores, esp. gutter cleaning. The ship has sailed as far as finishing exterior painting this year!

Thanks for the shout out for the Costco experience and product. I’ve heard the same from several friends who’ve gotten their aids through a Costco.
Joyce what state do you live in?
Thanks , Margot

In reply to imallears, we live near a tiny town on the Oregon coast, and Charter, now Spectrum, is the only choice other than CenturyLink (used to US West, commonly known as "US Worst" due to poor service). We actually have more stable service in a very rural location with more than a quarter mile of line to reach us here than we had living in the Portland metro area with CenturyLink. I had followed all the instructions to activate closed captions, but it seems that Spectrum had left out an important step. It took months of trying to get through to a real person to fix the problem. FWIW, we have very stable phone and internet, but TV freezes frequently--always during something you're trying to watch instead of commercials, of course! Once I finally got the REAL instructions to set up closed captions, they work fine. In some locations here, ours included, CenturyLink doesn't offer TV, which means zero TV, so Charter/Spectrum is very common...and has tons of complaints, probably because they're really the only universal game in town. Most months, we pay more for Charter than we do for heat--it's our single most expensive utility.

in response to imallears, re Spectrum:
Initially, we signed up for their triple play service, but the important thing first was to have phone, as we have no cell reception in our very rural location. It took two months and four different phone numbers before we had stable phone service. Then, I worked on internet, and, seven different service people later, it worked and has worked well for the past six years. Finally, months after we moved here, we tried setting up the TV, but it was one problem after another. We learned not to call for service, however, when one of the guys drove a one-ton Ford van (smaller than our extended, taller Club Wagon) up our long driveway. When he got ready to leave (still not having solved the reception problems), he was positive he didn't have room to turn around, although I assured him that I did it all the time with the larger rig. So, he backed down the driveway...until he got to the lowest place, the culvert across our creek. Afraid to back across the culvert, he tried to turn around, resulting in the van being high centered crosswise across the driveway, with the front wheels hanging over the water. We had to exit until a special tow truck arrived to winch the Charter van out! I think that service is very poor here because it's basically the only game in town.